gapintomirrorlandfandomcom-20200214-history
Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir
Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir (formerly just Mahrtiir of the Ramen is the last Forestal of the Land. He appears in The Third Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, in fact making his way onto stage solely in the last tome of the tetraology, The Last Dark. Appearance and Personality Once magically transmogrified into a Forestal by Caerroil Wildwood during a trip that Mahrtiir takes back in time with Linden Avery, Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir instantly assumes all the personality traits that one might expect from such eldritch tree-huggers. Facially, he looks much like his former self, except a little older, with grey now frosting his once raven-dark locks. However, as Forestals go, he is not particularly grumpy, which is somewhat surprising, given his erstwhile proud and stern demeanour. This is probably because becoming a Forestal brought a new meaning and purpose to ex-Mahrtiir's existence. He had particularly struggled with his sense of self-worth, feeling nigh on useless once having been blinded. Sure, he did his best to join in with his fully-sighted companions, even trying to get involved in combat against the seemingly never-ending waves of fell foes and dire adversaries that assailed them. Needless to say, this never went well - Mahrtiir's companions quickly learnt to keep their distance from him during any attack for fear of being enthusiastically assaulted by him in error. After that, it was invariably a piteous sight to see Mahrtiir in the middle distance, well away from the action, feverishly punching the crap out of a tree or eagerly trying to garotte a shrub, but everyone was just too kind to ever tell him. Role in the Third Chronicles Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir has a number of small yet important roles to play in The Last Dark. Having been transformed into a Forestal - as the result of a rash promise made to Caerroil Wildwood (Mahrtiir clearly wasn't aware of the history of Hile Troy or Caerroil's perverse predilection metamorphosing the blind) - Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir's first feat as a type of super-Gro-bag™ is to create a living honeymoon suite for Covenant and Linden, causing a living bower to grow, fashioned from the intertwining branches of a willow tree. One can only hope that the walls of said love-nest were well enough knit to prevent glimpses of the happy couple happily coupling... the thought of seeing Linden nekkid and enthusiastically bumping uglies is enough to put any right-thinking being off its dinner. Secondly, the now horticulturally-minded Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir decides to emulate the Lurker and see what he can do to deter every gardener's enemy, the mighty all-munching Worm. He thus erects a Forbidding (basically an arcane form of slug pellet) and succeeds in slowing Wormy down, allowing the forces of good to escape its annelid ravaging. Since he's the last remaining Forestal, Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir's final task is actually twofold. Firstly he's now gardener-in-chief for the entire Land, so he's going to be kept busy - hopefully he's got a sorcerous pair of secateurs, but maybe his erstwhile expertise as a Manethrall at shoveling manure will aid him. He is also obliged to act as combined teacher and minder of the remnants of the ur-viles and the waynhim, who as a result of ingesting souls of lost women (released once She Who underwent her therapeutic Oprah moment), have all decided that they rather fancy being apprentice Forestals as well. Unfortunately as many already know, mere enthusiasm does not a good gardener make, so it's unclear how things will turn out, herbaceously speaking. With Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir heading up the small pack of transformed Demondim-spawn, it does seem rather worryingly like the blind leading the blind in more ways than one. Category:Characters Category:Forestals Category:The Third Chronicles of Thomas Covenant